Karen "KK" Barranco
Founder | Brand Identity Strategist | Creative at Special Modern Design- Claim this Profile
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Bio
Scott Moe, PMP
I highly recommend Karen for fully comprehensive branding initiatives. Though she is already extremely well-known for her logo design skills, we found that we got a whole lot more when we engaged her firm. We really needed to redevelop our branding for our company, and we came to her with some vague ideas of how we wanted to represent in the market. Before working with us on and branding or design, she led an in-depth discussion on the best way to position ourselves in our market, differentiate ourselves from competitors, and the ways we would need to work to maintain brand integrity. From there, she started to offer various ideas around naming conventions, colors, and styles. Soon, the elements started to gel into a cohesive whole, which helped define our business and helped give it structure and meaning. I'm extremely pleased with the result and how fun and exciting it was. I highly recommend working with Karen for comprehensive business modeling, market positioning, and, yes, branding for your company.
John McWade
I love Karen’s design! It’s amazing what she can do with an idea, a simple typeface, a small palette of colors, and her impeccable taste. It’s magical, really. But the real magic is under the hood — she’s a clear, process thinker. She researches. She questions. She leads. She’s able to get to the heart of an enterprise and express it. The results can be delightful! They can also be profound. I’ve spoken more than once about her design for the Jennifer Diamond Cancer Foundation, and the story often leaves some of the audience in tears. Artistically, Karen has a light touch (lots of white!) and a flair for fun, yet her designs have gravitas — unhurried, established, permanent, as though they’ve always existed, even if the company is brand new! Any project is by nature complicated and messy; finding the common thread — that one image or icon or name — is extremely difficult to do well, and Karen’s a master. I recommend her highly!
Meryl Holland
Karen's work is differentiating and memorable. In the most recent work Karen did on behalf of my Personal Brand Clients, her work is strikingly creative and most importantly, authentic to the personal brand platform created so that the client usage is own-able and actionable in every way. Karen has an intimate understanding of brands and the people who use them or who are them. Emotionally, her work makes me smile. I recommend Karen knowingly and unconditionally. Meryl Holland, President M. Company & Friends and Brand New You Personal Branding Service
Scott Moe, PMP
I highly recommend Karen for fully comprehensive branding initiatives. Though she is already extremely well-known for her logo design skills, we found that we got a whole lot more when we engaged her firm. We really needed to redevelop our branding for our company, and we came to her with some vague ideas of how we wanted to represent in the market. Before working with us on and branding or design, she led an in-depth discussion on the best way to position ourselves in our market, differentiate ourselves from competitors, and the ways we would need to work to maintain brand integrity. From there, she started to offer various ideas around naming conventions, colors, and styles. Soon, the elements started to gel into a cohesive whole, which helped define our business and helped give it structure and meaning. I'm extremely pleased with the result and how fun and exciting it was. I highly recommend working with Karen for comprehensive business modeling, market positioning, and, yes, branding for your company.
John McWade
I love Karen’s design! It’s amazing what she can do with an idea, a simple typeface, a small palette of colors, and her impeccable taste. It’s magical, really. But the real magic is under the hood — she’s a clear, process thinker. She researches. She questions. She leads. She’s able to get to the heart of an enterprise and express it. The results can be delightful! They can also be profound. I’ve spoken more than once about her design for the Jennifer Diamond Cancer Foundation, and the story often leaves some of the audience in tears. Artistically, Karen has a light touch (lots of white!) and a flair for fun, yet her designs have gravitas — unhurried, established, permanent, as though they’ve always existed, even if the company is brand new! Any project is by nature complicated and messy; finding the common thread — that one image or icon or name — is extremely difficult to do well, and Karen’s a master. I recommend her highly!
Meryl Holland
Karen's work is differentiating and memorable. In the most recent work Karen did on behalf of my Personal Brand Clients, her work is strikingly creative and most importantly, authentic to the personal brand platform created so that the client usage is own-able and actionable in every way. Karen has an intimate understanding of brands and the people who use them or who are them. Emotionally, her work makes me smile. I recommend Karen knowingly and unconditionally. Meryl Holland, President M. Company & Friends and Brand New You Personal Branding Service
Scott Moe, PMP
I highly recommend Karen for fully comprehensive branding initiatives. Though she is already extremely well-known for her logo design skills, we found that we got a whole lot more when we engaged her firm. We really needed to redevelop our branding for our company, and we came to her with some vague ideas of how we wanted to represent in the market. Before working with us on and branding or design, she led an in-depth discussion on the best way to position ourselves in our market, differentiate ourselves from competitors, and the ways we would need to work to maintain brand integrity. From there, she started to offer various ideas around naming conventions, colors, and styles. Soon, the elements started to gel into a cohesive whole, which helped define our business and helped give it structure and meaning. I'm extremely pleased with the result and how fun and exciting it was. I highly recommend working with Karen for comprehensive business modeling, market positioning, and, yes, branding for your company.
John McWade
I love Karen’s design! It’s amazing what she can do with an idea, a simple typeface, a small palette of colors, and her impeccable taste. It’s magical, really. But the real magic is under the hood — she’s a clear, process thinker. She researches. She questions. She leads. She’s able to get to the heart of an enterprise and express it. The results can be delightful! They can also be profound. I’ve spoken more than once about her design for the Jennifer Diamond Cancer Foundation, and the story often leaves some of the audience in tears. Artistically, Karen has a light touch (lots of white!) and a flair for fun, yet her designs have gravitas — unhurried, established, permanent, as though they’ve always existed, even if the company is brand new! Any project is by nature complicated and messy; finding the common thread — that one image or icon or name — is extremely difficult to do well, and Karen’s a master. I recommend her highly!
Meryl Holland
Karen's work is differentiating and memorable. In the most recent work Karen did on behalf of my Personal Brand Clients, her work is strikingly creative and most importantly, authentic to the personal brand platform created so that the client usage is own-able and actionable in every way. Karen has an intimate understanding of brands and the people who use them or who are them. Emotionally, her work makes me smile. I recommend Karen knowingly and unconditionally. Meryl Holland, President M. Company & Friends and Brand New You Personal Branding Service
Scott Moe, PMP
I highly recommend Karen for fully comprehensive branding initiatives. Though she is already extremely well-known for her logo design skills, we found that we got a whole lot more when we engaged her firm. We really needed to redevelop our branding for our company, and we came to her with some vague ideas of how we wanted to represent in the market. Before working with us on and branding or design, she led an in-depth discussion on the best way to position ourselves in our market, differentiate ourselves from competitors, and the ways we would need to work to maintain brand integrity. From there, she started to offer various ideas around naming conventions, colors, and styles. Soon, the elements started to gel into a cohesive whole, which helped define our business and helped give it structure and meaning. I'm extremely pleased with the result and how fun and exciting it was. I highly recommend working with Karen for comprehensive business modeling, market positioning, and, yes, branding for your company.
John McWade
I love Karen’s design! It’s amazing what she can do with an idea, a simple typeface, a small palette of colors, and her impeccable taste. It’s magical, really. But the real magic is under the hood — she’s a clear, process thinker. She researches. She questions. She leads. She’s able to get to the heart of an enterprise and express it. The results can be delightful! They can also be profound. I’ve spoken more than once about her design for the Jennifer Diamond Cancer Foundation, and the story often leaves some of the audience in tears. Artistically, Karen has a light touch (lots of white!) and a flair for fun, yet her designs have gravitas — unhurried, established, permanent, as though they’ve always existed, even if the company is brand new! Any project is by nature complicated and messy; finding the common thread — that one image or icon or name — is extremely difficult to do well, and Karen’s a master. I recommend her highly!
Meryl Holland
Karen's work is differentiating and memorable. In the most recent work Karen did on behalf of my Personal Brand Clients, her work is strikingly creative and most importantly, authentic to the personal brand platform created so that the client usage is own-able and actionable in every way. Karen has an intimate understanding of brands and the people who use them or who are them. Emotionally, her work makes me smile. I recommend Karen knowingly and unconditionally. Meryl Holland, President M. Company & Friends and Brand New You Personal Branding Service
Experience
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Special Modern Design
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United States
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Design Services
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1 - 100 Employee
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Founder | Brand Identity Strategist | Creative
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Dec 2000 - Present
Working closely with business owners and thought-leaders, my company helps build purposeful, coherent, and profitable brands. Companies eager to re-position a tired old brand identity or have the need for a new corporate identity frequently approach advertising agencies or large design firms only to find their projects handed off to inexperienced designers or interns only to turn into a game of 'telephone'. As a brand communications and design provider for more than 20 years, my company has purposefully remained lean and manageable for that reason. Special Modern Design keeps the same set of eyes on the project every step of the way to tell a cohesive brand story whether business to business or direct to consumers. • Brand and Marketing Strategy • Brand Identity • Company and Product Naming • Web Design and Development • Art Direction • Packaging and Merchandising • Logo and Graphic Design Show less
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Brand Director
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May 2001 - Nov 2002
During the dot-com boom of the 2000s, I worked as an independent Creative Director for a well-funded start-up. Then I moved on to a technical based design firm, RedAnt Media Group U.S.A., as Creative/Brand Director. I provided direction for brand experiences in a variety of newly-emerging online platforms. During the dot-com boom of the 2000s, I worked as an independent Creative Director for a well-funded start-up. Then I moved on to a technical based design firm, RedAnt Media Group U.S.A., as Creative/Brand Director. I provided direction for brand experiences in a variety of newly-emerging online platforms.
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Creative Lead on shape.com
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Dec 2000 - Jul 2001
One of my first projects as Special Modern Design was collaborating with Guidance Digital and Weider Publishing, Inc. as the lead and only front-end designer on their websites Shape.com and FitPregnancy.com which included Shape Magazine’s proprietary fitness tool called iShape.com. Since then I have redefined businesses from architects to beauty products. (You can see the body of my work at http://specialmoderndesign.com.) front-end designer on their websites Shape.com and FitPregnancy.com which included Shape Magazine’s first proprietary fitness tool called iShape.com. Show less
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Creative Director
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Dec 1999 - May 2000
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Evenson Design Group
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United States
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Graphic Design
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1 - 100 Employee
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Creative Director
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Feb 1993 - Nov 1998
I was the Creative Director for about 5 years at Evenson Design Group. There I led multi-talented teams to create identities & designs for some of the world’s most iconic companies such as Apple, NBC Universal, DayRunner, Disney, Mattel, Warner Bros., Nestlé, Cartoon Network, Reading Cinemas, and many more. It was at Evenson where I worked with well known, large scale brands. A highlight is when I took on the herculean task of directing multiple creative groups to develop and design unique merchandise for the then pre-constructed theme park in Orlando called Universal Island’s of Adventure. The task included brand storytelling-based product design for three of the six properties, or ‘islands’, at the theme park. I designed hundreds and hundreds of unique SKUs per property for: 1) The Port of Entry, 2) Jurassic Park, and 3) Seuss Landing (in which we were the very first to introduce Dr. Seuss products to a mass market, including our proprietary Baby Seuss, and the first Seuss style guide.) --Led Design Team on Corporate Identity and Brand Projects, like Universal Studios Islands of Adventure, Reading Cinemas, Warner Bros Sport... Show less
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Education
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University of New Orleans
